The BFA iteration of MM onwards is inherently flawed

Classes Hunter
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Since the rework of legion mm going into BFA, mm hunter has been a mess. It went from a great flow of focus management, vuln windows and cool abilities like sidewinders and windburst.

Sadly we lost this incredibly cool and thematic spec for the BFA onwards iteration which just feels like a mess. The core loop of aimed into dump precise shots back to aimed is ok but none of the cds or other abilities interact at all with the core gameplay loop. The remaining abilities are either use on cd and just do damage or rapid fire just being another focus generator. Trickshots is also incredibly dated design and makes mm feel awful in 2 targets as well as the bs that can be trying to have your multi hit all 3 targets if they aren’t stacked neatly. We have even had patches such as post mm buff Abberus where the optimal st build didn’t run precise shots and it really showed just how dull and barebones this iteration of mm is.

I don’t think that blizzard needs to reinvent the wheel I believe that legion mm was a great baseline and could definitely fit into the world of the DF talent system. Bringing back tools like windburst and sidewinders would do wonders to freshen up mms kit and actually bring meaningful cds that interact with your kit. I believe that the vuln window into casting big hitting aimed shots fantasy was such a great foundation for what mm should play like and am absolutely gutted with what they have turned the spec into.

I am desperately hoping that mm gets the attention it needs going into 11.0 as this spec as is just currently doesn’t cut it design wise.

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Couldn’t agree more, I was actually just about to make a post for some ideas about an overall MM rework and hero talent concept that I think is being completely grazed over and forgotten about.

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100% agree.

the biggest problem with bfa → onwards iteration of MM is that it lacks a real gameplay loop. you have no mechanic to pay attention to and there’s not really a skill floor or ceiling. can you pay attention to your focus? congrats, you’ve got the spec down. it’s very much a tutorial spec which I think really holds a lot of design space for the spec down when it comes to think like cap stone talents, tier sets, etc.

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Worst take in the entire history of WoW. Classic Hunter is better than Legion Hunter.

It couldn’t fit into the DF talent system without it being:

  1. Required and mandatory for all builds because it gives the best DPS.
  2. Pointless because it’s more efficient to stay baseline MM and have all of your damage not tied to an RNG conditional with a 7 second window that requires you have full focus to even use, because if it was an optional playstyle that didn’t directly buff damage, then it would just be clutter + complicating a simple rotation.

They removed Vuln because no one liked it but you and maybe a few sparse others. They instead made the damage baseline. Now you don’t need an RNG proc or to balance a rotation around it. It’s simpler to manage. Complexity doesn’t always make something better.

Opinion, generally disagreed on by most.

Rapid Fire is not a strong focus generator. You gain 7 focus when you use it, it costs nothing, but it does more damage than Aimed Shot and can be cast while moving. The 4pc makes Rapid Fire your highest damage dealing ability by far, and it hits higher overall than Aimed Shot.

Chimera Shot.

MM needs a rework. It doesn’t need to be nuked into the ground with Vuln again. Get out of here.

I hope it gets attention too, and that vulnerability is left in the garbage bin where it belongs. I made several suggestions that would improve the current iteration of MM, what you’ve made here is a suggestion to rip out all of the damage until we get an RNG proc to do our damage. Go play Combat Rogue and toss the bones, don’t you dare bring back the meta of spamming Arcane Shot until you got a lucky marking targets proc.

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Are you joking?

All specs have a “required and mandatory” gameplay loop except MM. MM should not have to suffer with a boring and flavorless gameplay loop.

why do you think it would be a 7 second window RNG conditional window?

If you read my reply, you’d be able to see that actually designing a gameplay loop (such as vuln windows) for MM would open up design spaces for said mechanic. there’d be talents to extend vuln, force vuln, etc.

Neither does simplicity. People yearn for an MM that’s actually fun to play. Not to mention, current MM has a complete mess of an identity, and an actual mechanic would help sharpen the focus.

Most as defined by whom? Most people I talk to about MM prefer Legion MM as you had a fun loop.

It’s quite literally just a stronger Steady Shot with a cooldown.

vs the boring, dated, classic era meta? I’d much prefer legion MM with marked shot and windburst

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Well, no. But MoP MM, BfA-ShL-DF MM, or perhaps even Cata MM? Sure.

Legion MM wasn’t the worse iteration MM has seen. It comes close to it, but let’s not exaggerate.

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I feel like anyone who thinks classic isn’t the worst of any spec just needs to stop kidding themselves…this is not engaging gameplay.

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No.

Required: Aimed Shot, Rapid Fire, Precise Shots. Not required: Vulnerability. It’s flavorful, you’re just one of those people with cillantro taste buds that taste soap.

That’s what it was in Legion.

I did, and your post alluded to Legion MM being good. I was just reiterating that you’re wrong.

We’ve inversed Vulnerable into Trueshot. Use Trueshot Aura more and you have your DPS window on command.

You have talents already that do what vuln does, but doesn’t apply it as a condition to the target, and instead gives yourself a powerful buff that makes your Aimed Shot and Rapid Fire amazing.

I guess no one plays Classic WoW, then. You know. With raid bosses that have 3 mechanics, and 1 button rotations.

And fun is subjective to everyone, Vuln was universally disliked. You are one of the very few people that loved Vuln.

The top three things people want from MM is a Sniper, a Run-and-Gun Hunter, and something more like Hunter/Rogue Hybrid. Vuln is not a fun mechanic to the vast majority.

90% of players who played Legion, which is why it died in 1 expansion.

It’s really not. SS is 10 focus with a cast time, low damage, spammable, you pop 2 for Steady Focus and you never want to cast that if possible. RF is an extremely high damage ability that works with Trick Shots, and is prioritized because LotWR recharges it, and AS has a chance to reset it. It’s not a primary focus generator. Its more damage than Aimed Shot which is why you’re building it up and spending it so quickly.

MM is not boring, it’s just a mess all over, and it’s a struggle to play because the talents are all over the place + it’s hard to take AoE and ST in the same tree without sacrificing the other to the wolves. On top of that, MM is really squishy. There’s a dozen problems with MM, vulnerability is not one of them, and vulnerability would be the deathblow to the spec. No one likes wasting a GCD on applying mark, and in the same sentence, no one wants to focus on getting >ONE< debuff before unloading.

Just use Trueshot. It’s reversed Vulnerability. Instead of making the target weaker to your attacks, you make your attacks much faster. Take the CD reduction talent if you want to use it often.

Then you should go play on a private server, or wait until the Cata, MoP, and WoD phase is over on Classic servers.

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Isn’t it crazy just as many people hate precise shots as they hate vulnerability? Guess people just dont like MM that much.

Are talent trees the same they were in Legion? :thinking:

clearly it’s not universally disliked since there’s several people ITT that like it lol

isn’t this funny that the first two in your list are the exact opposites of each other?

Oh did you poll everyone? Like I said, people I know that played in Legion deeply miss it compared to how bad it’s been on BfA onwards.

gosh maybe if it had an actual mechanic to use and build around it wouldn’t be a mess and a struggle to play?

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Lets keep it civil I do the same even tho I strongly disagree with your mm rework posts and think that version of the spec would be incredibly unfun to play.

Just like plenty of current talents lol but also I meant that the entire iteration of legion mm could just replace the current tree we have with certain things baseline and the rest talents etc

Did u not play 10.1 mm lol it was literally this

A boring rotation that has a severe lack of a solid gameplay loop

Source?

Source?

Sure its just another use on cd ability that generates focus

Have you seen how much damage it does lmao this shows that you don’t really understand current mm if you think chim shot is the answer. Having aimed and rapid fire not cleave means mm damage in 2 targets is dogwater.

Pretty uncalled for given all I did was post my opinion imagine if all of your feedback threads were full of comments like this.

So because its your opinion its better? Yikes

I mean you realise it was a pretty reliable proc unlike say wrg in 10.1

I wouldn’t call it lucky given that the proc rate was pretty high. I think maybe you struggle with understanding both current and legion mm.

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It was as anti-sniper as you could get via a tickle/poke spam until RNG finds an opening for a 7s “you can actually use your skills now” window…

…unless you chose to shoot a conal AoE of snakes that completely invalidated the core and “innovative” mechanic, which most people I’ve seen calling said mechanic engaging nonetheless chose to do…

All that being said, apart from bloat, Legion meme-burst AoE builds were pretty fun, and Legion ST wasn’t too awful in long fights. The vuln mechanic was just almost completely athematic for a sniper, better fitting some manner of torturer.

Though, I had to pick BfA+ or Legion to build a personal “ideal” MM from, and vuln was as optional as (a balanced form of) Surging Shots, Legion wouldn’t be far behind. It’s basically just the RNG required to even really initiate (or else waste that mechanic entirely via SWs) and the button bloat that bugged me.

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I really feel like with the DF talent system, vuln wouldn’t be as restricting as some feel it would be. There would be talents to give vuln on any crit, talents to make vuln last longer, 100% there’d be a talent to force vuln, etc.

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This is what I don’t get:

I’ve basically never seen anyone claim vuln was an attractive mechanic who didn’t also take Sidewinders. In which case… they didn’t play with Vuln anyways, but rather just with a button each for Opener, GoodSpender AoE, GoodSpender ST, and Redundant Filler Spender ST, Redundant Filler AoE, and Redundant Builder ST, all to accomplish less nuance and interactiveness, actually, than BfA+'s version of MM.

It basically just took the modern kit and turned it into a Higher Priority set of ST spender, AoE spender, and ST builder and Lower Priority set of ST spender, AoE spender, and ST builder, instead of just consolidating the two halves into what can actually make a difference, all while thereby being able to additional mechanics atop it.

Legion was no less “hit-on-CD”. Its “Focus-banking” nuances around Vuln/SW windows were no complex than optimizing Steady Focus, by itself, is now. It was just a more bloated and less customizable version of the same thing, with far more being restricted by RNG outside of meta builds, to the point of frequently being completely athematic for a sniper.

Let me be clear: I’d be fine with a window-capitalization akin to Patient Sniper, but that doesn’t need a baseline Vuln window. You can get the same effect through having actions which increase your maximum Focus and having Aimed Shot consume a portion of maximum Focus for proportionate effect, all without needing to support arbitrary categories of “In Vuln” actions vs. “General” actions.

Similarly, you can throw in a Cata Master-Marksman-style mechanic wherein your shots reduce the cast time on your next Aimed Shot without reducing its damage, instead of starting with your immobile burst when most free from pressure and then having Precise Shots through which to reposition after. I don’t know why, as a sniper, you’d want to start with poke and chip/ramp your way up to burst (that seems more “Pursuit” than “Marksmanship” to me), but that could certainly be an option, too.

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At any rate, the spec definitely needs a unique gameplay loop or mechanic like every other spec in the game :stuck_out_tongue:

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It has at least 6 mechanics beyond just “use X on CD”, though?

  • Aimed Shot itself, as a bankable immobile burst tool
  • Trick Shots (not great, but has more going on than Beast Cleave, especially through the combination of Precise, Lethal, and/or Volley)
  • Deadeye gamble’s impact on optimal AiS timing
  • Surging/Lethal RF-CDR conditioning (higher contribution the greater the remaining RF CD / RD CD up to 5s [technically, lower mod(5+GCD)])
  • Steady Focus, ensuring that Focus will be low enough per 14s to double-Steady without overcapping and that the final among any StS pair is timed to allows its Haste window to be optimized
  • Volley delays/anchoring per Focus-matching / CD-sync

And that’s ignoring minutia that are class-wide but for which MM is the most affected/effective such as…

  • Explosive before Chakram due to delayed damage
  • Sentinel Owl optimization
  • Making maximal use of Posthaste windows (since that has to be timed around AiS, unlike on BM or SV)
  • Manually multi-dotting [tab-target DoTing] via Serpentstalker’s (which BM can do with Barbed Shot and SV can do with RS/MoS via Serpent Spread, but both of whom are [slightly, in BM’s case] less affected by CDs than MM)
  • Etc.

Which, altogether, is double what Legion MM had going on.

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let me rephrase, it needs a gimmick / unique mechanic like every other spec has. things like aimed shot (use when you have a resource) is not a unique mechanic to the spec.

like, SV has mongoose fury, BM has the barbed shot frenzy mechanic that I don’t recall the name of, etc.

MM’s gameplay loop boils down to “generate your resources and spend your resources when your abilities are available”. If we absolutely cannot bring anything new to the spec (which would be criminal) I would really like to see both steady focus and precise shots be unavoidable and more of a focus on the tree

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It doesn’t, though — not baseline. If you’re going to count Mongoose Bite, which we don’t get til mid-tier, why would you not count those among MM’s additional mechanics that are added even in early-tier?

It’s… Frenzy. Or a buff unnoticeable except from logs (Thrill of the Hunt), or a buffed basic attack (Brutal Companion) that’s also generally unnoticeable without critting and without a short parse.

It doesn’t, though…? Certainly no more so than SV or BM…

Unironically, just change current Trueshot into +25% Haste, +25% casting speed, and +25% shot cooling speed, instead of putting all eggs into the AiS/RF baskets, and voila, you’ve got room for Precise Shots and a far smoother AoE loop.

Steady Focus is already pretty significant, but if you want it to be more so, that just requires offering additional potency via an optional child talent below it.

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I don’t think you’re understanding me, MM doesn’t have something like that

It’s also something. MM does not have anything :question:

I don’t know what to tell you, OP is not the only person to feel this way, I am not the only person to feel this way, a very substantial portion of MM hunters in the discord server feel this way.

a lot of people feel that MM as it is from bfa onward is just not a fun to play spec

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I liked legion mm because arcane shot as a focus generator just made so much more sense than steady shot. I understand having to cast aimed shot but having to cast steady shot for focus just blows imo

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It literally has multiple things which each actually affect its gameplay, adjusting its APL, unlike Thrill of the Hunt or Brutal Companion.

I don’t know what to tell you beyond if you honestly think MM is no more than “build resources, spend resources,” that sounds like a skill/awareness issue. It’s objectively got (slightly) more between/beyond those two aspects than SV.

  • …and that’s coming from an SV main who heavily enjoys SV and is interested in both SV theorycrafting and what more nuances SV could have under slightly different tuning and therefore giving SV’s gameplay the benefits of each tuning adjustment that could open up its gameplay further.
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